Linux developers have managed to get Google's Android OS running on an iPhone, providing an open OS for the most closed of platforms.
The Linux On The iPhone blog has been mucking about with booting utilities and drivers for a while, but can now demonstrate a duel-boot iPhone that will switch between Apple and Google at a power …

Somewhere...

Jobs doesn't care

Apple and Jobs doesn't care if some Linux geeks spend hours upon hours getting Android to run on the iPhone. You still have to buy an iPhone, so Apple made its money. Plus, the percentage of iPhone users who would want to install Android on their iPhone has to be less than 1%.

You would think this yes

What you have described is "normal" technology company behaviour.

However, the reason why we have all these excited news stories/debates about Apple & Steve Jobs is *precisely* because they're strange and seemingly go out of their way to irritate people -- e.g. by deliberately making later iPod versions hard to run third-party firmware on by encrypting the database of tags/metadata (which were originally XML files, I think).

That's not where they make their money..

"You still have to buy an iPhone"

True, but that's not where Apple makes the real $$$. They make their money from taking a slice of *everything* around it - your calls, your bandwidth, the music you buy, apps, Google use - everything. If they could bill you for breathing near the phone they would, but there's no App for that yet. Coming soon: every bit of news you get and the books you read, coutresy of the iPaid, sorry, IPad. This fits perfectly into Jobs' obsession with control - even Gates never dared to venture where Jobs has no problem treading.

To run a different OS on the iPhone is thus a worse act of blasphemy than jail breaking it - this is not just filing through the bars, this is ripping a complete wall out of the prison and putting up signs everywhere for other prisoners to make use of it, provided they get this stable (and they will, I think). It also allows Google to completely outmanoeuvre Apple for revenue - they can sell music too, without Apple getting a dime/penny/cent, and sell ads without having to part with a percentage for using the iPhone as a platform.

I honestly cannot see Jobs even sleep before the developers have come up with a new iPhone OS release to fight this off. I'll be very surprised if this takes more than, say, a couple of weeks.

A bijoux bit wrong there

My iPhone bought on PAYG, unlocked by Apple (via O2) and now running a Vodafone 30-day SIM-only. So how are Apple exactly making any "slice" out of my calls or monthly SIM-only rental? The rest of the diatribe is marketing, not control. Jeezus - you lot make me laugh - if you were in business would you be prepared to give it all away? Oh hang on, maybe thats why you're not the successful business Apple is, 'cos they're not brain dead stupid.

Back on topic - I can't see the real point of running Android on the iPhone hardware other than simply to say that it can be done, and someone's actually done it. It isn't two fingers up at Steve Jobs or Apple or whomever. Its pure and simply a feat of technical dexterity performed on some hardware. And not particularly suitable hardware at that (lack of buttons required by Android).

iPhone Tethering in Canada

@Red Bren - a data point from Canada

My iPhone telco of almost-random choice (Rogers, they had the iPhone first) now includes tethering in the data plans. Obviously you still have to pay for the bandwidth consumed, but they no longer care if the bits end up on the iPhone or your laptop.

Its not the itunes thats different...

its the audience. iTunes on OSX is obviously being used by Apple-Fanbois, iTunes on Windows Apple-Haterz. Hence the dissconnect between opinions of iTunes on the different OS's even if they are identical.

re: "can't judge Windows based upon" etc

Of course you can. Binder was shit, Vista is shit, and that sums up the rest of Microsoft's output pretty well. Of course, the rest is not quite AS shit as Vista, but it still gives you the general idea.

@AC.... again...... for the last time........

Erm, are you stupid or merely pretending to be (troll like fashion) - apple only does proprietary, numpty. They are totally protectionist even to the point of censorship.

What I'd like to do with MY phone is MY business NOT anyone elses and certainly not apples.

As for iTunes, well, perhaps one of the most badly conceived and executed apps of all time as well as the previously mentioned protectionism.

To educate you, go to http://www.jrmediacenter.com and/or http://yabb.jriver.com/interact download the trial and be amazed at what a reasonably well thought out media player & management app can do - it makes iTunes look very, very stupid indeed. It's just a shame that apple keep on screwing with their interfaces to break compatibility with this & other apps that manage not only the music and playlists better but also the portable playback devices.

Lastly, adding insult to injury - all apple products (even apps) are top loaded here in the UK (perhaps all of europe?) so a $0.99 app is £1.72!

Yeah, apple is really a great company, ripping off it's customers, enforcing censorship not only on it's customers but also other businesses, shafting it's own shareholders . There is no defence of apple that makes any sense other than greed, so do not bother trying.

As I originally said, I am voting with my wallet and will not be lining apples pockets with any of my hard earned. If you wish to sustain apple with your money by buying it's products whilst it treats you like a chump, that is entirely up to you.

Let me pre-empt your slagging that I will be buying into Android and all that it entails...... Right now IMHO Google really is far less evil than apple.

Dive into the punchbowl...

No. The poorly thought out nature of iTunes is readily apparent even on MacOS. The fanboys just don't complain because they've already drunk the cool-aid.

Since the iphone is heavily subsidized, there is a much lower entry barrier for users that might not otherwise buy into a completely different computing platform. It's far more likely that a non-partisan will be running an iphone versus a Mac.

Most people aren't going to blow $600 just so they can thoroughly try out MacOS.

Well, obviously..

Who said...

Version?

Interesting, I wonder what version of Android that was. My 2.0 and now 2.1 Motorola Droid has different call answer and in-call screens, which don't require external buttons. It would useful on the iphone with it's button-challenged design.

DMCA?

If Apple doesn't get this strangled via the DMCA it could be the first wedge into opening Apple's overly restrictive platform. We now have precedent for "a user may install whatever operating system they want on their hardware". So Apple may have trouble enforcing their view in all jurisdictions.

Apple makes its money with the hardware but uses the applications and the uniqueness as bait. Android is showing that anything that works on the oh-so-cool jPhone is available elsewhere. Demonstrating this and possibly better performance would be a chink in the armour.

interesting

I think I will be grabbing this as soon as a 3G version becomes available. Too often have I foloowed a tweeted link only to find that it is to something in flash and been unable to see what was interesting.

Use for unsupported iPhones?

So his Jobsiness decided to completely cut off the 2G iPhone, and ban the 3G from having true multitasking ... at least down the official route.

Now you can keep your iPhone updated ... with ANOTHER OS! hahahahaha!

I doubt Apple will be amused by this. It means that their artificially obsoleted iPhones can be actually upgraded and kept everything but obsolete. This hack works only on 'older' iPhones, so whoever wants to run this will buy a used iPhone. Apple doesn't get any cash on used iPhones. Whooops!!!

Gunfight in the Cupertino Saloon!

It's as if a gun toting Android has kicked down the doors of the Cupertino Saloon, downed a few shots of whisky without paying, and called 'make my day, punk'. Question is, will it smash up all the furniture, harrass the fine ladies and pin Jobs Cassidy and the iPhone Kid to the dart board with their own switch blades before lurching off down the street to rob the iStore with it's partner Feathers 'Tux' McGraw?

I'll stick to the day job... But an opportunity for a playmobil recreation perhaps?

It'll be funny to see if they can get a 2G 'which hasn't the resources for multi-tasking' managing exactly that with Android instead of iPhone OS. Now what would that imply?

Naming competition

Of course, once droided, I guess an iPhone is completely lost to Apple. No iTunes recapture, nothing. The cost of weak defences against gaolbreaking (am British) could be enourmous if it becomes trivial and desirable to droid an iPhone...

There's a need for a naming competition, winner gets a bottle of bubbly from El Reg. My head starts are:

Nice

Interesting

The CPU in that generation of iPhone is underclocked so it's slower than a Hero but if reset back to its original speed it would be more along the lines of a Legend. Combine that with a larger amount of flash (that can actually be used for installing apps, one thing that annoys me about androids) and there could be the makings of a nice littel android phone.

My only concern is the lack of a "back" hard key, would this cause problems for day to day use I wonder?

Great for the geeks that found out too late...

... that the iPhone is NOT a geek toy. When it came out, it was the first of its kind and had a whole stack of features that no comparable device had. It was like a new flavour of ramen, every geek had to have one in order to hold up his head at sodium parties.

About six months later the realisation started to set in - first of all, a lot of non-geeks have them, which diminishes its status as a geek toy to start with. And then, the development tools are actually fairly limited. We can't do low level operations on the hardware for best performance, we have to use this J-J->throws up<-Java stuff. Java is not a geek-friendly language. Most good geeks are allergic to it, to a greater or lesser extent.

So what I'm trying to say is, those geeks that were snared by the geekness of the iPhone when it was new and are now trying their best to keep them out of sight until the contract finishes, now have a new option. Get a true geek OS on your existing hardware and have the added geek cred of using alpha code for everyday use.

Boot Camp for iPhone?

Apple actively supports Windows on Mac hardware, so why not Android on iPhone?

Now what we need is a pointy clicky wipe, unlock and install Adroid. Sweet, because I, personally, am a bit bored with my iPhone now. Don't get me wrong, it is an amazing device, I just bore easily ;-)

There is a growing number of 'obsolete' iPhones out there (iPhone OS 4 doesn't work properly on 3G, which has to be the most popular model), so an alternate OS would be a breath of fresh air.

LETS HOPE THE SLOW ISN'T NORMAL!

God I hope no one else misses the fact that its so slow that it may speak volumes for Android OS in all the phones out there in general!

If the Apple OS on the phone is able to as efficiently run the device with the limited hardware and still give a highly tuned and smooth user interface experience, it shows badly for Android in general as an operating system that is inefficiently designed or programmed or both! And severely lacks any polish or attention to the details that are important to actual users and not tech head number freaks.